Picking Up the Pieces
by Philote
Summary: What is left of us when we’re gone? And what will it mean to the people we leave behind? The remnants of SGA1 pack up Ford’s things.


Title: Picking up the Pieces

Author: Philote

Rating: PG

Summary: What is left of us when we're gone? And what will it mean to the people we leave behind? The remnants of SGA-1 pack up Ford's things.

Disclaimer: The characters and situations of _Stargate Atlantis_ do not belong to me. I make no money from this story. Please don't sue.

Author's Note: Written for the sgaflashfic 'personal items' challenge. It is set early season 2, shortly after "Runner," before "Lost Boys."

oOo

John Sheppard would never be known for his love of regulations. But just then, he was wishing that every member of the original Atlantis expedition had followed them stridently.

Unlike John, Ford had not been prone to break the rules. But he was still a 25-year-old kid, and one could really only expect so much when asking a kid to pick the one thing that was most important to them, and make it something smaller than a breadbox.

But really, one personal item would have made this difficult enough.

He held the third 4 x 6 photo in his hands. It was wrinkled slightly, losing its rich color on the edges; obviously held often. He sank down onto the edge of the bed, unable to help studying this picture as he had the two previous ones.

"Who is in this one?" came the soft voice over his shoulder.

Teyla still found photographs an utterly fascinating thing. He tilted it towards her, but said nothing. The first one had been Ford's grandparents, the second a shot of him and his sister. But he didn't know what to say about this one. In it, a slightly younger Aidan was surrounded by several other young men and women, one girl tucked close at his side and smiling at him instead of the camera. John had no idea who any of them were.

He'd resisted this for so long. When the new expedition members had arrived on the Daedalus and been in need of new quarters, many of the previously occupied rooms had gained new tenants. But not Ford's. He'd ordered it left the way it was. Aiden Ford was not dead, and he'd need these quarters when they brought him back.

Elizabeth had said nothing to contradict him for a while. But after they'd dragged Dex back here, after they'd encountered Ford and she'd heard both his and McKay's accounts of the events, she'd finally stepped in. "We'll just box them up, and keep them here," she'd said gently. "We won't send them to his family. Not until we're sure."

But the truth was that they might never be sure.

All the same, he couldn't put it off any longer. Teyla carefully handed the photo back to him before she turned back to the closet, from which she was pulling everything and carefully packing it away in a large cardboard box. John was equally careful as he placed the photographs in his box and went back to the little drawer in the bedside table.

He was interrupted as the door abruptly slid open and their scientist stormed in, stopping short a few feet in and taking up a stance not unlike the one he used in the labs to make his underlings cringe.

"McKay," John greeted warily, not rising from his seat.

"Hello Rodney," Teyla said much more pleasantly.

"Teyla," Rodney responded shortly with a brief nod. Then he glared at John.

John arched an eyebrow and asked casually, "What are you doing here?"

Rodney's expression darkened. "Well Colonel, if someone—perhaps, oh I don't know, _you_—had told me about this, I might have been here sooner."

John blinked at him. "I expected you'd have better things to do," he responded frankly. And it was true. He'd expected to be told that something was more pressing in the lab. Sentimentality wasn't exactly the scientist's strong suit. And, as Rodney himself had pointed out more than once since his little romp through the woods, he and Ford weren't exactly friends.

Rodney bristled, crossing his arms across his chest. But the gesture was less angry, and more self-protective. He seemed to be searching for an appropriate response, but when he finally spoke he said simply, defensively, "Well, I don't."

John shrugged, heaving a sigh. "Fine. Grab a box, you can work on the dresser."

Rodney gave a sharp nod and turned to follow the instruction. John frowned at the easy obedience, but let it go in favor of turning his attention back to the table. He pulled out a flashlight, a pencil, and a couple of pens before he encountered something else that wasn't standard-issue.

It was a spiral-bound little notebook with a textured navy cover, nice and expensive-looking. John flipped it open curiously to find that most of the pages were filled in Ford's distinctive scrawl. The entries were dated, and John caught several names that he recognized before he shut it quickly, knowing he had no right to be in it.

He sat still and silent for a long moment, and thought of his own stash of personal items. The football footage was meant to be shared. So was _War and Peace_—if he ever got through it. But that was far from all he had brought. And much of it was meant to be his and his alone, remnants of a life he'd lost long before he'd stepped through the Stargate for the first time. Trinkets and pictures he could never explain without spelling out his past.

He glanced up at Teyla, reverently packing the box, and Rodney, strangely subdued as he wrested with a regulation shirt. He could practically envision the two of them sifting through his things, wondering what each meant. He looked back at the book in his lap, trembling ever so slightly along with his hands. Maybe he should box up some of those items before their next mission, just in case.

He cleared his throat, wishing he could clear the morbid thoughts as easily, and reached to tuck the photos inside the journal before placing it in the box. Then he refocused his attention on his remaining teammates. After a few seconds of watching McKay's version of packing away clothes, he had a smile playing at his lips. "Rodney, who taught you to fold?"

The scientist glanced up at him in surprise, then surveyed his work. "No one. I am perfectly capable of figuring some things out on my own, Colonel."

John stood and moved closer to look pointedly into the box. "Yeah, I can see that."

"What's wrong with them?"

"Nothing. If you like the rumpled, slept-in look."

"I suppose the military frowns on wrinkles."

"I think anyone who's ever operated an iron frowns on wrinkles."

He didn't get the expected snark in return as Rodney pulled a frown of his own and stared at the shirts.

"Rodney?"

"I folded Peter's things the same way," he confessed in a mumble.

John felt a stab of something in his chest, and for a few seconds more he simply watched the scientist. He'd made an assumption about McKay that he clearly shouldn't have.

He wondered briefly what Rodney's personal item had been.

In the next instant he was mentally kicking himself, and hoping he never found out. And Rodney was squinting at the clothes he'd folded, face scrunched up such that John thought he must be imagining Peter's mother unpacking her dead son's things—and having to iron them. "Rodney," he called softly, shaking his head. "It's all right. Your folding is fine," he added, lying.

Rodney gave him a sideways glance. "Of course it is," he declared, only a trace of uncertainty in his voice. He tipped his chin up and turned back to the dresser, digging into the bottom of the drawer.

John, wary of somehow making things even worse, turned and wandered back towards the bed. Teyla was casting him a look that he couldn't quite read—and wasn't sure he wanted to. Behind him Rodney suddenly gave a half-suppressed snort of laughter, and John turned back to see what could possibly be amusing about any of this.

Rodney caught his eye and held the t-shirt up by the collar in front of his own torso. He looked down at it and then up at Sheppard, eyebrows raised and lips quirked slightly.

It was kind of small, probably a youth size. And it was red—the bright sort of red that, unless you were in some sort of Christmas play, pretty much guaranteed notice. On the front was a large and very yellow Tweety bird.

John couldn't help his own grin.

"And to think, you were worried about wrinkles. What sort of message does _this_ send?"

"Give him a break, Rodney. It's probably some memento from his childhood. He was really just a kid, especially at heart."

Rodney looked up at him sharply, amused look gone. "_Is_, Colonel. He _is_ still just a kid."

John froze, caught in that gaze, and wondering why he'd said that. Wondering when he'd started thinking it.

McKay was eying him closely. "You're not the giving-up type, Colonel."

"And you're not really the optimistic type, Rodney," he shot back. "In fact, you're the one who said he was pretty far gone."

"And he is. But somewhere in there is still just a kid. A kid who, more than anything, wants us to believe in him."

It was John's turn to snort, though his was humorless. "What he wants more than anything is his next fix."

"That's the addiction, sure." He'd finally gotten the shirt into a semblance of a square, and he moved to place it in the box before continuing, "He wants to be the answer to winning this fight. He wants us to accept what he is now. He wants us to see." He paused, then shook himself and said more clinically, "There are emotional components to most dependencies."

John raised an eyebrow. "Been discussing this with Heightmeyer, have we?"

"Maybe. But now I'm just telling you what he said."

"He could have killed you, Rodney."

And that was what really hit him. More than chasing gung-ho after Wraith, more than stealing a Puddle Jumper, even more than jumping into that beam. Because if he was capable of killing a friend, then the big-hearted kid might really be too far gone to save. And while they might not have been friends in the strictest definition, he knew that Ford held a certain respect and affection for the socially inept McKay. He'd been protective of him.

"You don't think he would have?" he asked, and tried to pretend that there wasn't an element of desperate hope in the question.

Rodney hesitated, then shook his head. "I'm sorry…no. I didn't doubt the threat; I still don't. I'd love to tell you I wasn't afraid with him. But I think you know me too well for that." He paused, watching John's expression. "Then again, knowing me as you do…maybe I'm blowing it all out of proportion. I was probably never in any danger at all." He tried to smile. It rang as false as the words, and it was terribly obvious that he didn't believe them. But John felt a rush of gratitude for the attempt.

He couldn't meet Rodney's eyes right then, but he reached out and latched onto a shoulder as he looked away. As he gave it a firm squeeze, he felt a hand come up and grip his forearm in return.

Teyla had left the moment to them, using it to come closer and peer into Rodney's box. Just as the silence was threatening to turn awkward she asked, "What is a 'puddy tat?'"

The lump in his throat released with a chuckle. John tried to explain, "Pussy cat. See, Tweety—that bird there—well, he's a cartoon character. When he spoke, he had some problems with a few letters. S's sounded like D's…"

Teyla's eyes went back to the shirt. "And…he saw a pussy cat?"

John grinned at her expression, one he'd come to understand as '_those crazy Earthlings and their strange entertainment_.' He knew what he'd be asking for on the next DVD requisition list. Before he could answer her, Rodney ably took up the charge. "His rival was a cat named Sylvester, hence the pussy cat reference. Tweety always fluttered off unharmed and the poor cat got the worst of everything."

John stared at him, bemused by both his knowledge of the cartoon and his choice for sympathy. "Rodney, you're not supposed to root for the villain."

"I think it's allowed when said 'villain' is just following his nature, trying so hard yet remaining so pitifully helpless," Rodney scoffed. Then he thought about what he had said, and his face tightened. John sobered as well, sharing a brief look before both of them dropped their eyes.

And really, how did one define a villain?

It wasn't a thought he was comfortable with. He turned and went back to the bed, intent on closing the boxes up and finishing this job. Behind him he heard the tape dispenser's distinctive squawk as Teyla moved to package up the closet contents and the repetitive slide-thwap of McKay checking drawers to be sure they were empty.

John cleared his upper drawer of everything he could see and started to push it back in. A new sound stopped him, and he reached into a back corner to find something rolling around.

He came up with one marble. Clear glass, with small flecks of color: brown, orange, and gold. It made him think of autumn.

It was perfectly smooth, and he rolled it around in his palm. He wondered what was so special about this single marble that had prompted the young Lieutenant to smuggle it across the universe.

Rodney interrupted his thoughts as he plopped down beside him, sighing as if he'd been working for endless hours. "I hate packing."

John shifted to plant a hand on his lower back, giving him a push off the mattress. "No rest for the wicked, McKay. Now we have to carry it all to storage."

McKay groaned, but Teyla chose that moment to heft her own heavy box into her arms in one graceful motion. She then stood there with ease, staring at them expectantly. Whatever the scientist had been about to say died in his throat and he moved to tape his box without complaint.

John shared a grin with Teyla as he swept a hand through the drawer one last time. It was empty now. The entire room was empty, save the impersonal furniture, the non-descript boxes, and the three people bungling their way through a grieving process for a man who might or might not be dead.

John taped his box closed, and felt as if he were holding the pieces of Aidan's life in his hands.

And just what sort of life had it been? He would never have thought Ford the journal-keeping type. He hadn't known he was a cartoon lover, much less the names of all those in the photograph. And he had no idea as to the significance of the marble—which he abruptly realized he still held in his hand.

He glanced up at Rodney again. Maybe he'd try to find out what the scientist had brought, after all.

He rolled the marble through his fingers once more, then made a quick decision, and tucked it into his pants pocket. He'd transfer it to his vest later.

And when he found Ford, he'd ask for the story behind it.

oOo


End file.
